BMW Wants To Make Your Next Car A Truly Mobile 4G LTE Hotspot

Let’s say you want to go on a long road trip and you are taking along your wife and kids and naturally all of them have an iPhone or iPad or laptop or all three. They’ll be spending the entire ride playing around on those things, streaming movies, playing social games, answering emails, and reading the news.

To make that all faster and more enjoyable, you could bring a mobile hotspot. Or, your car could be the mobile hotspot.

That’s what BMW has enabled, as it’s rolled out a new feature that will let riders stay connected, by adding 4G LTE WiFi connectivity to its cars. BMW owners will be able to buy an optional hotspot that connects with the car and can use its antenna to provide blazing-fast wireless Internet speeds.

As part of our live coverage of CES yesterday, I went on a joy ride in a BMW Series 7 with Stephan Durach, head of the auto manufacturer’s app center, entertainment, and mobile device features, and got the chance to see it in action for myself. Check out the video above as we cruise the Las Vegas Strip and he demos the wireless connectivity and new apps for its cars.